Dear Editor:

Oregon’s infamous heat wave during the summer of 2021 was record-breaking, but it won’t be for long. Scientists expect that, given current trends, Oregon’s temperatures will increase by 6 degrees by 2050 during the summer.

In my community in Portland, I am especially concerned for the harm the rising temperatures have had – and will have – on my low-income and historically disadvantaged neighbors. Rent has increased at its fastest rate since 1986, making housing for many Americans completely unviable.

As someone who spent a portion of my childhood homeless and has come close to homelessness many times despite working three jobs as a full-time student, I cannot imagine how I would plan to survive in the heat waves of this new era.

But I have good news. We also know that the leading cause of this increased heat is due to the global production of carbon. This kind of doomsday information can be discouraging. Fortunately, we are empowered within our democracy to mitigate the issue through common-sense, bipartisan solutions that benefit all Americans in the long-run by ensuring a livable future. The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act (H.R. 2307) will help reduce America’s carbon pollution to net zero by 2050. It puts a fee on carbon pollution, creating a level playing field for clean energy. The money collected from fossil fuel companies goes to Americans in the form of a monthly ‘carbon cash back’ payment so that everyone can afford the transition.

Instead of prepping for increasingly extreme heat waves, Oregonians can take action for themselves and their communities by urging representatives Kurt Schrader, Earl Blumenauer, Peter DeFazio, Cliff Bentz and Suzanne Bonamici to support carbon dividends which guard our communities and our futures from the unjustly powerful.

Sincerely,

Ara Vickers
Portland

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Global design firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill has partnered with Prometheus Materials, a maker of zero-carbon building materials, to design and produce microalgae-based bricks and bio-concrete.

Replacing traditional carbon-heavy concrete materials – currently responsible for 8% of the world’s total Carbon Dioxide emissions – with a zero-carbon bio-concrete could rapidly accelerate the transformation of building construction into a carbon-free industry, according to a news release from both companies. As the need to decarbonize buildings becomes more urgent, the materials offer a promising, immediate, zero-carbon alternative to traditional, concrete-based building materials.

The material is created using naturally occurring microalgae – a microscopic algae that naturally sequesters carbon – and a patent-pending photosynthetic biocementation process. Microalgae is combined with water, sunlight and CO2 to create a material which is chemically similar to the calcium carbonate biodynamically generated in coral reefs and oyster shells. When mixed with aggregate, this bio-cement creates a net zero-carbon building material with mechanical, physical, and thermal performance properties comparable or superior to portland cement-based concrete.

The cross-industry partnership is an extension of Urban Sequoia, a design concept SOM unveiled at the United Nations COP26 Climate Conference, which envisions “forests” of buildings that sequester carbon and produce biomaterials to create a new carbon economy and a resilient urban environment.

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PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The Oregon Environmental Quality Commission has OK’d a new Climate Protection Plan for the state that targets a 90 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuels and natural gas by 2050.

The commission’s 3-1 vote comes after years of unsuccessful attempts by state lawmakers to launch an economy-wide cap-and-trade program to reduce the carbon emissions that contribute to climate change, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported.

“It has been an enormous lift to get this program to this point,” Commission Chair Kathleen George said after the vote.

Last year, Gov. Kate Brown ordered the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality to develop a new set of administrative rules that would cap greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels and cut them over time.

The resulting Climate Protection Program caps emissions from gasoline, diesel, propane, kerosene and natural gas and makes the cap progressively more restrictive.

Set to launch in 2022, the program will distribute a declining number of emission credits to fuel suppliers and allow them to buy and sell those credits as the cap comes down. It also creates a Community Climate Investment Fund that will permit companies to pay for emission reductions in communities most impacted by climate change.

The program will initially regulate 16 fuel suppliers and three natural gas utilities. Thirteen industrial facilities also will be regulated under a different system that creates individualized plans to reduce emissions using the best available technology. Companies that can’t meet the emission reduction targets could face financial penalties.

Companies have protested the higher targets, arguing higher prices for gasoline, diesel and natural gas will result and have ripple effects throughout the economy.

Industry groups did their own analysis of the program and found it would be more costly for consumers than what the DEQ is projecting, based on its economic analysis.

If prices in Oregon increase by more than 20 percent of the fuel prices in other states, Oregon DEQ staff will do a review to determine whether the program needs to be changed, Nicole Singh, DEQ climate policy advisor, said.

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The Portland City Council on Thursday unanimously accepted a report on the progress made toward meeting the Climate Emergency Declaration goal – but agreed more must be done.

The progress report was presented by the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability and the Bureau of Transportation, which updated the City Council on what has taken place since the emergency declaration was passed last year to accelerate climate-related action.

The five most notable commitments in the resolution passed for the building industry are:

1. Reduce carbon emissions by at least 50 percent by 2030 and by 100 percent by 2050;
2. Adopt new policies that reduce carbon from buildings and the transportation section, including movement toward readiness for electric vehicles;
3. Adopt new policies to prevent further expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure and accelerate the transition to clean, renewable fuel options;
4. Require transportation justice, so that projects and policies reduce carbon emissions while advancing racial equity; and
5. PGE and Pacific Power deliver 100 percent clean, renewable electricity to all Portland residents and businesses no later than 2030.

The climate declaration also recognized that the effects of climate change are often felt disproportionately – yet the groups affected are often the least responsible for contributing to it.

“People of color, low-income households, the elderly, children, and people living alone or experiencing houselessness are all disproportionately harmed by severe weather events like deadly and disastrous heat domes, snowstorms and wildfires,” the report stated. “These communities will continue to bear a disproportionate burden from climate change unless government policies, investments and solutions center their voices and priorities.”

In the past year, city staffers have made some progress in implementing the directives set by the Climate Emergency Declaration, according to the bureaus, including:

• passage of House Bill 2021 (signed into law by Gov. Kate Brown on Tuesday), which establishes an interim clean energy target and a zero-emissions target by 2040 for PGE and Pacific Power;
• adoption of an internal cost of carbon for city operations;
• support of a youth-led summit on climate justice (on Dec. 12, 2020, more than 150 youths convened for a daylong virtual summit);
• adoption of HR 2180, an EV-ready building code for new construction in multi-dwelling, mixed-use and commercial zones; and
• construction of several Rose Lane projects (and more in progress), including more than four miles of bus priority lanes and spot improvements to make buses and streetcars faster and more reliable for riders.

Future work will include eliminating carbon from existing buildings, focusing on embodied carbon and green building, electrifying and decarbonizing transportation, replacing dirty fuel with clean fuel, and decarbonizing the grid.

The focus moving forward, according to the report, will be on the building and transportation sectors, which account for most emissions.

“The actions we undertake in the next several years will determine whether or not we will meet the 2030 interim target to cut our emissions in half, and ultimately, whether or not we can achieve the emissions reductions necessary to stave off the worst impacts of climate change,” the report stated.

The report is available at: .

Also on Thursday, Brown for 23 counties, including Multnomah, to ensure additional resources are available for an anticipated heat wave.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said city commissioners and others did not foresee the record-breaking temperatures of late June suspected of causing the deaths of 116 people in Oregon, most in Multnomah County.

In addition to Multnomah, Brown’s heat emergency declaration covers: Benton, Clackamas, Columbia, Curry, Douglas, Gilliam, Grant, Hood River, Jackson, Josephine, Lane, Lincoln, Linn, Marion, Morrow, Polk, Sherman, Umatilla, Wasco, Washington, Wheeler and Yamhill counties.

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